Meet the man who eats 1,000 mince pies a year – starting in January – on a quest for the ultimate festive treat

• Will Torrent is part of a team of food experts who cook and sample festive foods
• The Christmas chef started his career shadowing Heston Blumenthal aged 15
• READ MORE: Revealed – the airlines most likely to ruin your Christmas

Fancy a mince pie?

The answer is always yes for Will Torrent, 37, who eats around 1,000 of the festive treats every year.

That’s along with his team of food experts – who start cooking and sampling festive foods in January on a quest to find the ultimate recipe.

Will’s first experience in a professional kitchen was aged 15, shadowing Heston Blumenthal.

Since then, the Christmas chef has been perfecting mince pies at Waitrose & Partners for nearly 13 years, using AI to better understand what flavours people around the world are raving about.

Will Torrent has been perfecting mince pies at Waitrose & Partners for nearly 13 years

The father of two, who lives in Maidenhead, Berkshire, with his wife Francesca and two children, nine-month-old Joseph and three-year-old Olivia, tests mince pies with his team throughout the year, starting in January.

Will and the Waitrose Innovation Team, who prepare their secret Christmas recipes 18 to 24 months in advance, are behind the brand’s new No.1 Crumble Top Mince Pies – as well as other Christmas favourites.

He said he ‘loves his job’, which consists of developing ‘all things sweet’, including chocolates, where he goes into full ‘Willy Wonka mode’.

‘I would probably say that we eat the equivalent of 1,000 mince pies a year,’ Will told PA Real Life.

‘We’ll start brainstorming our Christmas recipes mid-January [for the next 18 to 24 months] and we will literally be tasting throughout the year.’

Will’s love of food started with his grandfather John, who worked as a chef in hotels in London and Bournemouth, and grandmother Kath, who he described as an ‘amazing cook and baker’.

He said: ‘On both sides of my family, food has always been very important.’

During his first year of GCSEs, aged 15, Will was required to complete a week’s work experience and said that he would like to work in a restaurant.

Will samples mince pies with his ‘small team of foodies’ throughout the year

Fortunately, one of the teachers had a contact at a restaurant in Bray, who said they were willing to take Will on for a week.

‘That restaurant just so happened to be The Fat Duck with Heston Blumenthal,’ he said.

‘So my first ever week in a professional kitchen was shadowing Heston and having random spoons of food given to me to try.

‘It had a huge influence on my career and the way that I think as a chef.

‘It taught me to question everything and that it’s okay to not like something but articulate why… ‘

Will’s love of food started with his grandfather John (who he is pictured with above), who worked as a chef in hotels in London and Bournemouth

Will went on to study Culinary Art Management at the University of West London in Ealing from 2004 to 2007.

‘There was something that clicked with the sweet side,’ he said.

‘I also lived at home, so my mum Anne preferred me coming home with chocolate-covered aprons rather than fish guts.’

He was then offered a job at a Swiss patisserie in Thames Ditton in 2008 called Bachmann’s, where he honed his craft making classic patisserie and desserts, including mince pies at Christmas.

‘I look back very fondly on that time,’ he said.

Will and the Waitrose innovation team prepare their secret Christmas recipes 18 to 24 months in advance

‘We would be making these huge vats of mince meat in late September and beautiful butter pastry in late November – they were superb.’

In 2011, Will joined Waitrose’ food innovation team, first as a consultant and then as a full-time partner.

‘I’m probably my own worst enemy in the sense that I never switch off,’ he said.

‘I love my job and consider myself very lucky.’

The team begin fine-tuning their Christmas recipes 12 to 24 months in advance based on electronic data of people’s food preferences all over the world.

‘It’s Christmas all year round for us,’ he said.

‘We use AI to track electronic food data.

One of the recipes Will is most proud of is Waitrose’ award-winning No.1 Brown Butter Mince Pies with Cognac

Traditionally mince pies are made by mixing minced meat, dried fruits, spices such as cinnamon, cloves and nutmeg, and suet

‘Through analysing social media, menus and online recipes, we can look at what’s happening on menus in Sydney and see what’s happening with street food in Los Angeles.’

Will sits down with the food innovation team – a ‘small team of foodies’ that includes chefs, product developers and trend experts – barely a week after New Year’s Day and reviews customer trends from around the world and in the UK.

Traditionally mince pies are made by mixing minced meat, dried fruits, spices such as cinnamon, cloves and nutmeg, and suet, the hard white fat on the kidneys and loins of cattle, sheep or other animals.

‘The point I want to make is that we don’t just throw the kitchen sink at a mince pie because it sounds super trendy, we do it for a good reason,’ he said.

One of the recipes Will is most proud of is Waitrose’ award-winning No.1 Brown Butter Mince Pies with Cognac.

‘There was almost a magical moment when showcasing it to the rest of the team,’ he said.

‘There was almost silence, which can mean one of two things, either they hate it or they’re really loving it.’

Thankfully it was the latter and mince pie sales at the supermarket are already up 15 per cent this week year on year, according to Will, who ironically was not a fan of the Christmas classic as a child.

‘When it gets to the season we’re also looking at what our other retailer friends are bringing onto the market so we’re tasting their mince pie ranges,’ he said.

‘So I think we worked it out and it’s equivalent to about 1,000 mince pies a year between us.

‘I remember last year when we had that massive heat wave with record temperatures and what happens, the air-con breaks.

‘So we’ve got people sweating, wearing Hawaiian shirts and looking at Christmas puddings and mince pies. You couldn’t write it.’

Will, who admits that he struggles to ‘switch off’ from work, used to continue baking mince pies for friends and neighbours.

Will said he ‘loves his job’, which consists of developing ‘all things sweet’, including chocolates, where he goes into full ‘Willy Wonka mode’ 

But now, with children, that’s not so easy.

He said: ‘I have a nine-month-old and nearly three-year-old so trying to find time to bake after putting them to bed and wanting to watch Netflix is a no-no.’

He will, however, be cooking up a storm at his local church on Christmas day.

‘You can tell how much it means for people who are on their own or who have been affected this year by the cost-of-living crisis,’ he said.

‘At the end of the day, there will always be a Christmas pudding, there will always be a Christmas cake and there will always be a mince pie.

‘Our role is to remember where the roots of those products lie… because they are so directly linked to the people’s traditions, whether that’s stir-up Sunday making your Christmas pudding or eating your first mince pie.’

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